Always Bear Left ... and other ways to get things done faster and easier

By Ken Cooper

This is a re-release (with a few updates) of the fun classic from the early 1980's on how to get through life faster, easier, and cheaper. The title refers to which line to generally pick at Disney World, because most people in the U.S. tend to bear right. So the left line is usually shorter.
     Here's the situation...We live in a crowded world filled with too many people trying to do the same thing at the same time. The complications of everyday life eat up much of our time and energy, and prevent us from doing what we want to. But there are people who seem to glide through life avoiding the hassles and problems that plague the rest of us. They manipulate the system because they know how the system operates. They know how to get things done quicker, easier, and faster.
     Ken Cooper is one of these "insiders," and he shares a wide range of tips with the rest of us. In fact, he created this book easier and faster by doing radio and TV interviews asking people to send in their ideas in return for being listed in the book.
     The result is this goldmine of ingenious, funny, and unusual ways to live off-peak and avoid the crowds, to cut corners by cutting out unnecessary steps, and to pay less for more. You'll learn how not to wait at the doctor's office, how to make certain our car is services first, what time of day to call various kinds of professionals and find them in their offices, when is the best time to get a driver's license, how to minimize energy costs, how to avoid ripoffs, how to speed up kitchen work, and many, many other wonderful tricks for handling every aspect of our lives with the least hassle.
So find out how to Always Bear Left in everything you do.

• Language: English
• Publisher: TotalComm Press
• Release date: Jun 1, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393404415

Book preview

Preface

Not too long ago I saw a cartoon which perfectly expressed how the world is today. A nervous hijacker was talking to the pilot of an airliner demanding, Take this plane where it’s supposed to go and get it there on time!

It seems like that’s what it takes to get things done anymore. It’s a crowded world filled with too many people trying to do the same thing at the same time. The system is eating us alive. The result is that things work slowly (when they work at all.) Yet there seems to be a number of people who slide through life avoiding all the hassles and problems that plague the rest of us.

They are insiders who know how to get things done. They deal with the system and its people through their superior knowledge of how things operate. They are the I can get it for you wholesale of the lifestyle crowd. What they have done is to help us put together a book which shows you how to live wholesale too.

This book is actually a labor of love by hundreds of people. Early in the research cycle, I had my assistant busily ferreting out tips from a variety of sources. Suddenly the thought hit me, Who wants to read a book on getting around the system that the author had to write himself? Following my own principles, the easiest, fastest, and cheapest way to write a book was to let other people do the research for me. Instead of finding tips, I could let the tips find me.

So I called a local newspaper about the book and interested them in an article. The UPI picked up on the article and sent it on the national wire, listing my address. I copied the articles and sent them in a package to over 400 radio stations suggesting they do a phone interview and let people call in with ideas or pet peeves for which there was no answer. (See Appendix B.) I also gave out my address for those wanting to send in suggestions. As an incentive, I offered to list in a special contributors’ section anyone whose idea was used. (See Appendix A.) Before long, my mailbox was loaded with an incredible range of tactics.

My researcher and I then spent our time verifying the validity of the suggestions and tracking down answers to the more popular pet peeves. Ideas that were illegal (I have a great one for getting out of parking tickets), unethical (such as getting out of jury duty), or invalid for any reason were weeded out. You can be certain that the ideas here have the widest possible applicability and have been checked to the best of our abilities.

If you have a pet peeve, then leaf through this book. You’re bound to find several ideas for solving your problem. In fact, the top five pet peeves (as listed here, according to my radio audiences) all have straightforward solutions:

Waiting at the doctor’s office

Waiting in bank lines

Getting a car repaired when promised

Phone solicitors

Incorrect computer bills

If you have a pet peeve or idea not included here, then see the last page of the book to find out what you can do about it.

I specifically wish to thank my researchers: Bobbie Knoedelseder, Karen Gentles, and Jane Dreeben. Their creativity and perseverance helped uncover many ideas. Thanks also to Mary Frances Cooper, Todd Kamp, Joanne Carr, and Husaini Saifee for their tremendous efforts in getting out the manuscript against a tight deadline. Their efforts insured we could pack every last tip into the manuscript. And thanks finally to my wife, Sue, who has put up with someone who can’t go anywhere or do anything without stepping back to study how things operate.

Ken Cooper

1982

Table of Contents

1 — Becoming an Insider

Lost time is never found again!

John H. Aughey

––––––––

I recently finished an interesting little quiz, How to Calculate Your Life Expectancy, which appeared on pages 975 and 976 in The People’s Almanac #2. Everyone loves this type of exercise. We all want to dip into our future and see what it has in store for us— even if all we find out is how long our future will last. I’m no different. Based on my heredity and lifestyle, my number came up 77 years.

Now years don’t mean that much to me. I know what a year is, but I can’t really comprehend exactly what one feels like. I tend to think in terms of weeks—or better yet, days and hours. So I sat down with my trusty calculator and found out that I should experience a lifetime consisting of 28,124 days or 674,982 hours (or approximately 40 million minutes or 2.5 billion seconds). When I think of 2.5 billion seconds, I’m satisfied that I should have a long and fulfilling life.

But I next began to wonder how many of those 2.5 billion seconds were forever out of my grasp. As I write this, I have only 1.4 billion seconds remaining (only 23 million minutes or 390,000 hours). I’ve used over a billion seconds already and what do I have to show for them? How much fun have I had? How many of those seconds were a bust? a waste? an overall pain in the posterior?

I want my remaining 1.4 billion seconds to be more enjoyable, more interesting. I want to accomplish something of lasting value. I don’t want to spend my precious future the way I’ve spent my past —parked in the middle of a superhighway turning the air hazy during rush hour, reading a two-year-old copy of something like Dental Hygiene Today in a waiting room, watching the other line move faster, or sprinting out of the bathroom to answer a land-line phone call telling me my brick home needs new siding. No more of this for me. I want to be one of those skilled individuals who slide through life without ever making a right-angle turn. I want to be a pro corner-cutter in a world filled with weekend warriors. I want to be an insider in handling the events of life.

The Philosophy of Easier, Faster, and Cheaper

If someone asked me to describe the world, I would say, Left. It’s the only possible answer after listening to all the things in this life that are Not right. To many, the system whatever that represents, is a bit of security in a Future Shock world. This is not my attitude.

The system is fine when it works. But when it doesn’t, sometimes the only way to get things moving is to make it painful for others to keep messing with you. If you can negatively motivate them to get rid of you by taking care of your problem, then you have succeeded in a proper manner.

One of my favorite hints was sent to me by a woman with small children. Because of her husband’s work schedule, she was always stuck with taking the car to the dealer for service. Because she had no return ride, she had to wait. It seemed like others got their cars on the rack first, particularly men. When she complained, she was told that the men worked and had to get back or that they had a previous appointment.

After putting up with corralling the kids in the service waiting area, she came up with a perfect idea. The next time in for service, she brought along her children and a suitcase and sat down in the most comfortable spot in the main showroom. Then she took out her sewing. After a few more minutes she issued jelly sandwiches to the little darlings (bananas work just as well) and watched her offspring enjoy them all over the showroom. Amazingly, the car was ready soon after. She now carries her trusty suitcase nearly everywhere she goes if there might be a wait.

The Russians (reputed to be the only people in the world who can build old buildings) have a joke about the man going into one of the stores to buy a gift and finding two lines at the counter. One is overwhelmingly long, the other only discouragingly long.

He gets in the merely discouragingly long line and asks the man ahead of him What is this line for?

This is the line to get a special card which entitles one to first-class fast service, the man replies.

And what is that larger line over there for?

Ah, that is the line of people who have the card.

Desperate times call for desperate jelly sandwiches. I get somewhat rabid about people wasting my time. I’m very jealous about each and every one of my 1.4 billion remaining seconds. I never know when today might be the day I climb on the metro bus and sit in front of Godzilla or when some car bumper might choose to get to know me more intimately. I don’t want to spend my remaining days in a line looking at someone’s back.

All these books and articles that suggest ways to stay busy while waiting make me mad. It’s like giving people A-l sauce after burning their steak. You’re solving the wrong problem. The clever insider learns not to wait at all.

I also want my life to be easier. The less energy I use to work, the more energy I’ll have to play. (This doesn’t count mental energy. No one ever died from thinking too hard.) I want to be exhausted because I played the third set, not because I went the second mile. The workaholic is obscene. The playaholic is sublime.

Finally, there is the little matter of money. For several years a large part of my salary was respect, as in, I always respected you, Ken. Then one day I foolishly took all those respects I had earned to the grocery store and used them to pay for a cart of groceries. You can imagine my dismay and surprise when they wouldn’t let me have the food. Those respects didn’t buy anything!

There are lots of other mediums of exchange in use today—love, sex, status, etc., but none which are more valid than the still popular method of keeping score...money. My money requirements need not be excessive. Money translates into less work and more play, less drudgery and more fun, less waiting and more doing. Money is another form of time.

What I can’t adjust to is the time expenditures which show no return. Waiting in line at the auto license bureau buys me nothing. Making three trips to the store for something that still isn’t in stock not only gives me no benefit, but it raises the price of the object dramatically. I’m throwing away my 1.4 billion seconds like a tipsy gambler in Las Vegas.

The philosophy here is to get the most out of your life by letting society get the least amount of your effort, time, and money. While rental car competitors show us how to merely check out faster, O. J. Simpson is flying through airports. If you can’t manage the system it will certainly manage you. The difference is one of checking out or flying. The choice is yours.

Important People Psychology

Important People have it all over us mundane folks who carry fives and tens in our wallets. The reason is that IP’s know they deserve good treatment, while we just think we do. Watch the way IP’s saunter through a prestigious store or waltz into a posh restaurant. Their whole manner says, Okay, you tadpole, make certain you keep me happy. To get in this class, say to yourself: MY LIFE IS IMPORTANT. ONCE MY BILLION SECONDS ARE GONE I CAN NEVER REGAIN THEM. I AM THROUGH LETTING PEOPLE STEAL PARTS OF MY LIFE.

Time is a resource. It can’t be protected by converting it to an exclusive credit card (TIME—Don’t leave home without it!) It can’t be saved like money or stockpiled like nuclear weapons. No one has the right to throw your seconds away for you.

I’m always amazed by people who rationalize waiting hours at the doctor’s office by saying, Well, he’s so important and busy, I’m just happy he can see me today. wrong! Medicine is a profession like any other. It requires more education than a teacher and less than an actuary. Medical care is a service. A doctor has no more right than a grocery store or a hamburger joint to make you wait several hours for service. What the medical profession currently has is an imbalance of supply and demand. As long as there are more sick people than doctors to take care of them, there will be waiting.

So if a doctor has no right to waste your time, then no one does. I’m not saying we have to be insufferable with everyone around us. It is merely better to expect only the best treatment from others. I refuse to beg someone to let me help them make a profit. And whenever I act this way I have no problem with service. I refuse to do business with anyone who has stolen some of my precious seconds through their indifference or neglect.

The other advantage Important People have over us is that they are unembarrassable. (Either that or their threshold of embarrassment is immeasurably high.) The average person will do just about anything to avoid a scene.

A typical ploy clerks use when we come to them with a problem they don’t want to deal with is one which takes advantage of our reluctance to create a scene. They tell us, Look, I know you have a problem there, but I’ve got too many people in line right now and you’re holding things up. Could you move over there a minute and I’ll take it to the manager when I get a moment. As you shift uneasily from foot to foot, people keep coming up to the counter to purchase items or to get help. Your moment turns into ten or fifteen minutes until you remind the clerk or have another clerk ask if you need help.

The Important Person never falls into this trap. The IP doesn’t bother to turn around. He or she responds, Well, they’ll just have to wait since I was here first. I’m not moving a muscle until you get the manager over here and take care of this.

The clerk now must